THE PERSONS WHO PERFORM THE DIVINE-SERVICES
The Divine-Services in the Eastern Orthodox Church are performed by persons specially selected for this purpose and consecrated. These persons are: Bishop, Priest and Deacon.
The Bishop has the right to perform all the sacraments and to him alone belongs also the right to ordain to holy offices (priesthood), to consecrate the Chrism and the Temples. Some Bishops are called Patriarchs, others are known as Metropolitans, Archbishops and Exarchs. All these are different titles of honour in the episcopal dignity. A suffragan is called the Bishop who has no independent diocese and serves as an assistant to an elder Bishop.
The Priest or Presbyter, with the sanction of the Bishop, performs all the Church services, with the exception of those which exclusively appertain to the episcopal office. There are also different names of priests: protopresbyters, archimandrites, archpriests, hieromonachs [alt. hieromonks]. These express either the distinction of dignity or special duties of the sacerdotal office.
The Deacon helps the Bishop and Priest at the performance of the Church Services and sacraments. The different grades of the deacon's order are archdeacon, protodeacon, hierodeacon.
The above text was excerpted from The Most Useful Knowledge for the Orthodox Russian-American Young People, compiled by V. Rev. Peter G. Kohanik (Passaic, NJ: n.p., 1932–1934), using only minimal adjustments to the original text (such as correcting typographical errors and adding clarification in brackets of alternate transliterated spellings).